“No,” I say, finally finding words. “You’re not. You’re drunk.”
“Same difference,” Ray says, taking a swig with one hand and holding the little picture of Michael in the other.
“He’s talking to me.” Ray holds the picture so it’s face-to-face with him. “You hear him?” He tilts his ear like he’s listening closely, then fakes a little kid voice.
“‘Man up, mister,’” he makes the little boy in the photo say. “‘Cut the crap and do what’s right for once in your pathetic, wasted life.’”
Ray looks at me and shakes his head. “I want to tell that little face to watch his mouth,” he says, faking a stern face and voice. “But I got it coming. I want to say my name’s not ‘mister.’ But so far as he knows, it is.”
He’s a little face in a photo and Ray’s an awkward question, a subject best changed.
“Ray,” I say, but I don’t know how to finish the sentence.
He sets the now-empty bottle on the porch and tucks the photo into his wallet. He shucks off his coat and tie. He undoes the button at his collar and takes a deep breath.
“Are men supposed to be able to breathe in a suit?” he asks, forming his words like he has a mouth full of rocks. “Maybe that’s why men in suits look so uptight. They can’t breathe, and everything is a very deliberate effort not to choke to death.” He laughs out loud.
I smile a little. Ray always had a sense of humor—when he’d let down his guard.
“Give me your keys, Ray,” I say and hold out my hand. Go sleep in the bathtub.
He doesn’t resist.
“I went to the service,” he says. “I sat in the back of the church. Me and some guy from Dad’s nursing home. He asked me who I was, and I said I was the guy who mowed the family’s lawn.”
“Mom should fire you,” I say, attempting a joke. “The grass looks awful.”
He smiles at me. It’s a crooked, drunk smile, but I can see Ray underneath the cover of alcohol.
“Where are you going?” he asks me, looking me up and down. “It’s after dark.”
“Out,” I say. “It’s getting hard to breathe.”
“That’s because you got your tie tied too tight,” Ray says, tripping over the alliteration.
That may very well be.
Ray struggles to stand up. He wobbles a bit, but manages.
“Going to sleep?” I ask.
“That’s a nice way to put it,” Ray mumbles and goes off to pass out somewhere.
As a teenager, Ray squealed tires in and out of the driveway, banged in the front door, shot the stink eye at whoever was in his line of sight, then tromped upstairs to his room. He was determined to be angry. Determined to stay agitated and ticked off and if he stepped on your toes on his way across the room, all the better.
I think he hoped we’d kick him out of our lives if he was gruff enough. I saw on the news once where a man had “committed suicide by cop” or some such phrasing. For a time, Mom was sure Ray would do something like that. Pull one of his stunts and get himself killed. But Dad called it. He knew us all so well. He said that Ray wasn’t about to get himself killed. Dead, he couldn’t go on torturing himself and everyone in his path. Dad didn’t say it angry; he didn’t mean it as an insult. It was just the truth.
Ray did pull a few stunts that got him handcuffed and locked up for a bit here and there. He’d leave town, then turn back up with a new tattoo but the same angry face. He’d make a halfhearted effort and then disappear. Then he finally got himself put away. Dad said that was what Ray wanted. What better place from which to loath the world and your place in it than prison?
That was right before the stroke.
Now, with Ray safely inside the house, I pull out of the driveway and head into town. I don’t want to be alone, but I don’t want to talk to anyone either.
There’s not much open after nine p.m. on a Thursday except bars and restaurants and both are too lively for someone mourning the dead. So I go into the Book Exchange—a late-night cavernous maze of old books and busts of dead writers with low lighting from antique lamps and soft armchairs to fall into.
I wind my way past a few other patrons who are talking softly to each other over cups of coffee and leaning in to chat about stories other than the ones they are living. This seems the perfect place to hide from the world. I find a spot in the back corners of the room and sink down into a low couch. I lay my head back and close my eyes. I don’t find solitude for long.
“Remember me?” a voice says. “Oliver, from Elm Village.”
I raise my head and open my eyes. It had only been a few days ago that I had hugged him a good minute longer than was socially acceptable and then kissed him full on the mouth. His hair is the color of soft balsa wood, and even in the low light of the bookstore, his eyes are like the liquid flow and pool of the river’s edge, at times both green and blue, murky and translucent.
“May I sit with you?”
I nod, and he sits, shifting around in the seat until he appears much more comfortable than I am.
“Your name’s Nina,” he says.
“Yes, it is,” I reply, trying not to look him in the face again.
“I knew that,” he says. “You know—then.”
The parking lot.
“I’m glad,” I say. “It makes that whole scene slightly less desperate, don’t you think?” I reach out to fuss with the magazines on the coffee table in front of us, and the low light of the bookstore catches the gold rings still on my finger.
“Married?” Oliver asks.
I pull my hands back, hiding the rings. My face feels puffy and worn out. “Divorced. Recently.” I look away.
“Don’t give yourself a hard time. About the kiss, I mean.” Oliver dips his head so that he looks me in the eye, stopping my unnecessary straightening of things that were not out of order. “It’s part of my job to comfort people.”
“Yes, but do most people cling to you and smell your hair? And then kiss you on the mouth like they’re not a total stranger?”
He shifts again, looking a little less comfortable, but making no move to leave. The walls seem to close in, and the soft bookstore music becomes more noticeable.
“Did you really smell my hair?” he asks and runs his hand through it almost apologetically.
“I did,” I admit. “It smelled nice.”
The light is low in the store, but I can still see the pink in his cheeks.
“I get that a lot actually,” he says.
“Strange women make passes at you often?” I ask, completely embarrassed.
“You weren’t a total stranger. I’ve seen you around.” He smiles at me, and again I feel a sense of comfort wash over me, telling me not to sweat it so much. “And you weren’t making a pass,” he says. “I know that. And no, I actually don’t have a lot of women kissing me. I meant I often run into people who are seeking comfort. It’s kind of nice, I have to admit. I wish they weren’t sad, but I like being able to help.”
“Well, the ladies must eat that up,” I say.
“Sometimes,” he says with a tilt of his head and a shrug. “It’s the scrubs I wear for work. Women go crazy for them in the grocery store. They think I’m a doctor.”
“You don’t tell them any different?” I say, amused and distracted.
“You kidding?” He leans closer to me as if he’s telling me a secret. “Buys me some time. Much better than what I really do.”
“What you really do is commendable,” I say. “Most people wouldn’t be able to face all that every day.”
“Maybe I ought to stick with the truth,” he says and raises his eyebrows like he’s made a joke, but if so, I don’t get it. “Different uniform,” he says, “same principle.”
He leans away from me and fusses with the collar of his shirt. He meets my gaze and winks at me. I
’ve been out of the dating scene a long time, but I remember a wink being a flirtatious thing. With Oliver, though, I think it’s just a wink—what it means, I have no idea.
“It’s been awhile since anyone has kissed me,” he says. “You caught me off guard.”
“Don’t worry about it,” I say. “I kiss everybody. I just kissed that guy over there.”
I point to a patron perusing the ancient history shelves. Oliver laughs out loud.
“It was a nice kiss, I have to confess,” he says and looks a little forlorn. “I had forgotten.”
He says it like he’s much older than he must be. He can’t yet be thirty, but he speaks as if he’s come back into the world from some faraway place and time. He looks at me, and suddenly there are questions across his face that I think I’m supposed to have an answer to, but I don’t quite know what they are. I can only imagine that my face looks much the same.
I should pull away from this, but the feeling of connection is intoxicating. We both seem very aware of an electricity between us. This isn’t like me. I don’t do things like this. I see other people do it and am envious. I’ve even “liked” a couple of posts from old high school friends who were in the midst of middle-aged new love.
Seriously, they would write. I forgot what this feels like. Head over heels.
I wonder if this is how Jack felt. I can understand how he let himself get carried away by the excitement, the racing heartbeat, the attention. This is how we should have made each other feel, but I suppose it’s too late for that now.
“Can I be honest with you about something?” Oliver asks.
“Sure.”
“I’ve been thinking about that kiss,” he says very quietly, looking over his shoulder as if someone might hear him. “I’ve been thinking that I’d like to kiss you again.”
He looks different in plain clothes. Older, but not by much. I can almost see forty in my rearview mirror, and if he’s twenty-five I’d be amazed.
Oh, my. I am sitting in a dark bookstore with a gorgeous younger man and thinking about doing something really rash.
Do it girlfriend
Send us pictures
How young are we talking?
Like
Like
Like
“I think that would be ok,” I say and then shake my head. “Well, that sounded lame. I’m sorry, I’m not used to the dating scene. It’s been a while. I didn’t expect to be back here again.”
“Me either,” he says.
Oliver and I sit for a few moments in that uncomfortable sort of silence that’s created by wanting to say something but having nothing safe to say. We watch each other watch each other. We laugh at each other’s awkwardness a time or two. Whatever this is, the electricity is still sparking and it starts to feel pretty good.
“It was a good funeral,” he says, breaking the growing silence and the awkward unanswered offer of kissing and being kissed. “I hope it’s all right that I went.”
“Of course,” I say, impressed that he had been there. “I saw a few faces from Elm Village, but I must not have seen you. Not that I would have had the nerve to speak to you.”
He waves his hand to let me know that apologies and regrets are unnecessary.
“I’m glad I had the day off and could attend,” he says. “It’s weird to come in to work in the morning and be given this laundry list of reports, with part of it being the news that Mrs. So-and-So is in the hospital, and 212A died. I hate when they use the number like that. Nate was more than 212A.”
“Thank you for saying that,” I say, emotion trekking across my chest.
He smiles and winks at me again. It’s completely benign and surprisingly comforting. I feel like I did in the parking lot before I kissed him and made things weird. How he manages to wiggle back and forth between friend and possibility, I’m not sure. Perhaps it’s more indecision than anything else. I’m sure he can sense that he’s welcome to—but yet, he doesn’t.
“So how was the family mourning vigil?” he asks, scooting back from me and hitching his knee up on the couch. “I hate that part. What are you supposed to say to all those people? How many times can you handle someone telling you what a terrible loss it is?” He moves his leg back down and slides back closer to me. “Duh, huh? Thanks for forcing me to talk about it over and over to every unearthed aunt and uncle within a day’s drive.”
I laugh. An actual laugh, deep and real. One that almost makes me cry, but then pushes into more laughter. It’s a different laugh than Lola and I shared in our room reliving old memories and taking about boys.
I need this release from the grief and the weight of missing Dad. I need to get out from under the loss of my marriage and the uncertainty of my future. I need to stop checking my phone every two seconds to see if my teenage daughter still loves me.
I need to find happy again, but I have no idea how to do that.
I’ve spent the last twenty years of my life being everything to someone else and feeling guilty when I thought of myself. I’m not even sure what I’m guilty of, but it makes me sad. I’ve been holding onto my guilt like he’s an old friend, like I’m showing him around town for the weekend, pointing out all the tourist traps and scenic views. I need to send him home. I need to stop feeling guilty for wanting, dreaming, hoping.
“It was fantastic,” I say in answer to Oliver’s question.
“Glad to hear it,” he says, and the corners of his mouth turn up.
I feel an urge to press my lips to his again. I’m like the last moments of the tulip now. I feel my petals pulling backwards, bending me toward something I don’t recognize.
“Want some coffee?” he asks. “Do you have to be home or can you stay?”
“I shouldn’t,” I say, still thinking about the kiss he offered.
“Drink coffee or stay and talk to me?” he asks, his eyes clearly showing that he hopes I’ll stay.
I feel yanked back in time to a place much less burdened with responsibility and the knowledge of life’s cruel pranks. I need this escape.
Ok, guilt, I say to my old friend, you sit over there for a while and read a book. I need a break.
“Decaf,” I say.
He smiles widely, and I can see that I’m in deep trouble.
I’m hooked before my coffee mug is half empty. The longer Oliver and I stay, the closer we get, and by the time the bookstore music loop has repeated itself at least once, we’re pressed beside each other on the couch with no more room between us than the space a heartbeat takes.
I look back once at my guilt. He’s sitting in on a book club meeting and talking to a lady about Jane Eyre.
Just a few more minutes, I signal to him, and he nods.
I turn my focus back to Oliver. This isn’t like the parking lot, where I was too caught up in my own crazy grief to notice what being close to Oliver feels like. We sit beside each other, talking about everything and nothing. His knee is against mine, and I touch his arm unnecessarily when I speak. He touches my hand where I have it resting on my own leg just so that it’s available. He moves his fingers across the back of my hand, and the softness of his touch electrifies me. As he presses his hand more firmly against mine, I turn my palm over to meet his fingers as they search out mine.
I feel giddy and a little sick to my stomach. We run out of things to say and that offer of another kiss hangs between us, visible and pulsing.
“I don’t know if this is the right thing to do,” I whisper, my fingers interlaced with his, my face turned to his, my lips inches from his.
His lips press first against my cheek like a test, and I release a breath I didn’t know I was holding. Then when he kisses me, I’m aware of nothing but his mouth on mine, warm and unfamiliar. He puts his free hand against my face and then pushes his fingers through my hair until they find the back of my neck. His hands on m
e feel like I’m coming up out of the water, air hitting wet skin piece by piece. This time, it doesn’t feel like the pathetic science movie. This time, it feels like waking up.
I think of Jack and his lopsided smile, and I catch a glimpse of my buddy, guilt, across the room. I close my eyes and ignore both of them.
This divorce isn’t what I wanted. Jack did this same thing. I think.
I stop thinking, just in case.
“I think the store is closing,” Oliver whispers in my ear, his lips brushing the side of my face when he talks. “Walk with me for a while and talk some more, yes?” He asks like he’s seeking permission.
Outside on the sidewalk, Oliver puts his arm around my waist, and I slide into him. He whispers something in my ear, but his words are breathy and my head is fuzzy so I don’t understand him, but I laugh anyway. I turn my face up to his and he kisses my nose. When I look back toward the street, I see Jack across the road.
I blink, and then it’s not Jack after all.
We walk past my car in the parking lot and down a few blocks toward a little section of old houses with quirky flower gardens and yard sculptures that catch the moonlight and toss it back out as magic. Oliver stops in front of one of the houses and bounds up the stoop. I remain on the sidewalk, and he looks back at me quizzically.
“Is this your house?” I ask. “Maybe I should go home.”
He closes his eyes and turns toward the sky, relief and regret on his face, and I wonder what his story is. Bad breakup? Still in a relationship, perhaps? I realize how much I don’t know about him.
He comes back down the steps. I want so much to be that romantic type who throws caution the wind. I imagine said wind, loaded down with the cares of innumerable people caught up in moments too strong for them, too passionate or reckless, desperate and unmanageable. I imagine some French couple at an outdoor café in Paris, sipping their coffee, smoking their cigarettes, being blown right out of their chairs by some rogue, heavy laden wind from the other side of the world. Crazy American fools, they would say, righting their chairs, lighting a new cigarette, calling for the garçon to bring new cups of coffee and perhaps a patisserie while he’s at it.
The Lemonade Year Page 8
